Guardians of the Portals

by Nya Rawlyns

  Zack coughed once, the sound echoing with a weird trilling sound. Kieran hissed 'shh' and repositioned the rifle as he swept the area. It was still, far too still. Zack tried to stifle a yawn, as he squirmed to a more comfortable position.

  Muttering, "I think we're out of time," Trey looked around the rock strewn ground. "Where are the charges?"

  Kieran waved to a duffle bag behind Zack and motioned for him to bring it over. The man nodded and grabbed for the straps but before he could latch onto them, he fell forward onto his knees with an 'umph'.

  "Zack, wha—" Kieran's voice drowned in a piercing cacophony of ultra-high frequency ululations. It was all he could do not to clap his hands over his ears.

  Nose and ears bleeding, Zack straddled the bag briefly as he rolled to the side, his momentum carrying him downhill until he reached the granite outcrop and stopped. He seemed to be murmuring something, but Kieran couldn't hear for the ungodly noise driving all thought from his brain.

  Trey cursed out his entire pantheon on one long breath as he limped over to Zack and checked for a pulse. He indicated the man held on, but judging from the amount of blood pouring from his nose, mouth and ears, there was no way to know for how long. The din in their heads threatened to burst blood vessels, so sharp and insistent and painful that they could barely stand, let alone think. Like electronic voice modulators, the indigenes seemed capable of altering acoustic pressure—a chorus in a continuous detonation of murderous clamoring. He had no idea what the effect might be on the ordnance, particularly the ammunition. Trey planned to blow it, but he doubted that included them sitting right next to it.

  His friend mouthed, "I'm setting the charges," and motioned his intentions.

  Kieran stuffed rags in his ears to try to cushion the effect. It helped, but not much. With no way to know how long the indigenes could keep up the racket, they needed Trey to work fast. That wasn't going to be easy under these conditions and he couldn't help wondering if the painkillers flooding his friend's system, making his every movement sticky and cartoonish, would help or hamper his efforts.

  Though the man lived in pain every day of his life, his indulgence might be one of those things none of them would live long enough to regret. He'd tried to stop his friend from overdosing on the meds but Trey said he wanted to have full mobility, or the semblance of it, to get them to safety through the Portal.

  It was the kind of argument he was all too familiar with—the pot calling the kettle black. With the portal no longer operational, they were going to be out of options one way or the other.

  When Trey failed to activate the sequence, he'd been as surprised as the rest of them. But knowing the man's abilities, he'd bet the farm that Trey probably had a good idea as to why and an even better idea as to who was behind it. It was the how that eluded him and that was troubling on a lot of levels since he was considered to be the expert on the damn devices.

  The man lived too close to the edge, not caring if he lived or died, ready to sacrifice himself and anyone unlucky enough to be at ground zero. He was acting like he was ready to take a long walk off the short pier.

  Unless...

  ****

  Jake paced the corridors, mindless of anyone in his way. He longed for a smoke but the tobacco police made that option unattractive with über-sensitive sensors, so he and Gunnarr repaired to the roof when need overcame self-control. He was on his way, climbing the last few steps, when his cell phone buzzed.

  "O'Brien here. Yeah. What do you mean, locked down? How is that even possible? No, don't do anything. I'll be right there."

  Jake sank to the step and dialed the capo. He relayed the information, then mumbled, "I'm on my way."

  Gunnarr met Jake at his office door and motioned him in. "I talked with Eirik. He claims he knows nothing about the lockdown."

  "Do you believe him?"

  "Of course not. Even if he weren't directly responsible, he certainly knows who is."

  "I assume you explained what's at stake." Jake walked to the plate glass window and stared at the lightening sky. The orange-tinged clouds had a moody feel, almost sub-tropical, as the weather flip-flopped from near spring to arctic blasts and back.

  "I gave my brother as much information as he needs to know. I did not share particulars."

  Jake spun to stare at Gunnarr. He sputtered, "Don't you think he deserves to know his nephew is stuck on the other side?"

  The capo shrugged. "My brother has been oddly disinterested in Trey's whereabouts and activities. I strongly suspect he has given up on him. In any case, he says he will ... and I quote, 'put my people to work on the problem.' He did say one thing that I'm not sure I understand."

  "What?"

  "He said, 'let the Falcon find the way.'"

  Jake looked perplexed. "So he does know your son is stuck on the other side. And that means he has the ability to find ... what, other Portals? That's a good thing, right?" Jake sat on the bench seat by the windows, working through the logistics. "He finds them. No, wait. What if he can...?"

  Gunnarr leaned on the desk, his fists pressed hard into the walnut veneer. "Work it out, O'Brien. I want to know if you come to the same conclusion."

  "He can make them, God damn it! He can make them!"

  Gunnarr nodded and continued, "I don't think 'make them' is exactly the right description. I think it's more like he senses favorable vortices and can coax them into a pattern. If this is so, Trey will be trying to find the right patterns. So it will just be a matter of time."

  Jake felt the first ray of hope press against his ribcage, though knowing Kieran was trapped with a homicidal, suicidal maniac was cold comfort. There was no guarantee that the Falcon would even try to save himself, let alone his men.

  Head aching, Jake mentally ticked off their limited options. It was fine to spin theoretical webs, but they were no closer to getting their two sons out of harm's way. He stalked to the door but halted as the capo called out, "Where are you going, Jake?"

  "I'm going to find Fletcher and beat the crap out of him. Then I'm going to figure out where they'll pop out." He turned to sneer at Gunnarr, "I suggest you put your people to work on it."

  Chapter Three

  The words echoed strangely, phantom shapes, ovoid and alien. Caitlin set the bit of wood down, her fingers still tingling from the contact. She reached for ... something, but the image faded. Like a waking nightmare, madness and clarity wrapped her in their soft embrace.

  The kitchen had been maximized for efficiency. It sat at the rear of the cabin, enclosed, almost an afterthought to the open spaces, with the soaring ceiling, and stairs leading to the loft and the sleeping areas. A door to her left led to an alcove—a laundry and mud room, so necessary in rural Vermont—then a corridor of sorts, more an enclosed walkway linking the main house with the garage and an attached shed crammed with hardwood logs. The enclosed corridors were a necessity in winter, protecting the occupants from the elements as they moved from the comfort of the living quarters to the more utilitarian workrooms and storage areas.

  Troubled by the faint remembrance, and the disturbing physicality of the hallucination, she walked to the back door, undecided. The man had yet to return, a mercy really for she would be hard pressed to even look at his face without her embarrassment giving her away. Why had she forced a contact so intimate, so fleeting?

  Time is your enemy. You must slow it down, stopper its passage, observe how it coats the surface, shifting. Like oil on water, part of, yet not, carried, dispersed. Gather those bits, see how they change and reform. Make it your own.

  Caitlin glided into the anteroom and quietly eased the door closed. Never and always alone, her spirit—more than anything—craved solitude. She reached for her quilted jacket, and startled as she stared in the mirror next to the coat rack.

  Damn, I hadn't meant to shift.

  The red hair always amused her. She pulled at the unruly mop, so different in feel and texture than her own pin straight, muddy blonde tresses. T
he tee-shirt strained against now generous breasts, though without containment the effect seemed matronly rather than alluring. She smoothed the soft cotton and adjusted the neckline to accommodate her body's new proportions. Her finger tips brushed across her nipples, the sensation oddly arousing as the nubs hardened instantly.

  She flushed. Muscle memory. His fingers, thick, calloused, rough. Assaulting, demanding, owning her body—a possession so pure, so simple ... so right. His and his alone.

  But no longer...

  This new link was like a dam breached as Wolf's hard body pressed against hers, a wall of passion loosed in a rush. It settled into a steady flow, never ending, sluicing through her center.

  What was happening to her? Why him? Why now?

  She hadn't meant to change. Her body had automatically responded to the remembered stimulation. She wondered if each time she shifted, the template became permanent, filed away for later, then unconsciously selected to suit circumstances, an Amazon warrior for him, prim proper schoolteacher for someone else. Mercifully it hadn't happened when he'd practically crushed her against the door jamb. That might have been difficult to explain.

  "At least you didn't turn into the Friday blue plate special or shrimp-on-the-barbie." She laughed at her reflection. She really needed to regain control over the process.

  Caitlin shrugged into her jacket and grumbled, "Oh shit," when it wouldn't close. Her broad shoulders and ample breasts were several sizes beyond her normal lean frame. She pulled it off and grabbed the man's wool plaid jacket, examining it critically. She would swim in it but at least it buttoned and would keep her warm. Gathering her long hair into a knot and stuffing it into a watch cap, she slipped on thick insulated gloves and sheepskin-lined boots, then headed into the corridor and exited through a people door at the back end of the garage.

  Though only mid-afternoon, the heavy cloud cover and light snow blanketed the clearing in a uniform pale monochrome of grey-on-grey. Dense woods lay in every direction—trees, brush, deer paths, a small catchment pond at the base of the drive, rotted out fencing guarding a weed-strewn vegetable patch. This had once been a viable settlement; the knoll on which the cabin now stood had been cleared and planted. The settlers had claimed the land one rock at a time—a laborious task—and stacked precisely to fit each stone, edges tight, mortar-free. She'd yet to find the end of the property line on her rare forays into the outside world. After her weeks of exposure to the alien environment, she'd preferred to stay inside, safe and protected, if only in her mind.

  Caitlin followed a disappearing line of boot tracks, obviously his. The man often prowled the grounds, bent on some silent sentinel task. He did not keep to a routine. She never knew when he'd be about, interfering in her thoughts and commanding her attention. She resented the intrusion into her plans. So much of her training required meditative silence and a concentration on inner space. Simply the presence of another person disrupted her attempts to understand and control the process.

  She longed for the less complicated days when her ability to change shape amounted to a clever parlor trick, done to amuse her parents and Kieran. She remembered watching her mother morph in front of her eyes, ever so subtle shifts that stripped years from her face, and the hollowed out yearning in her father's eyes on the rare times they came together as a family. She and Kieran never once questioned their mother's decision to stay on the homestead on the Eastern Shore of Maryland while Jake spent his Marine career stationed across the bay. It might as well have been on the moon so seldom did he visit. Yet he was the one she adored, along with her brother, the men in her life always her singular focus. Her mother had been nothing so much as competition for their affections and attention.

  Shuddering, she regretted the sudden insight into the dynamics that made her the empty shell she'd become. Eirik's tutelage and focus on the past had loosed her own carefully segmented memories—memories that threatened to overwhelm her with needs and desires she'd long denied.

  He had changed all of that with a simple touch...

  The rapidly filling indentations ended at the base of the driveway, then doubled back on a parallel track. The man—Wolf— had come to look for the mail, or check on the state of the road. Plows did come through regularly as the property sat on a county road, though the lane-and-a-half sandy path barely qualified. It had a name, bestowed in some distant past—Owens Bridge Road. Apparently the sandy track led to the Owen's place two miles up the mountain, crossing a bridge at some point—such were geographic names in the Green Mountains. There were few road signs and the ones placed by the county often carried names at odds with local usage. If Owens lived up that road, by default it was his road, the naming part of the rights of settlement. The locals had geography and topography hard-coded into their genetic structure. Only newcomers, summer people with their dainty cottages and improvements, required the formality to cement their visitation rights.

  Eirik had taken her to the grocery store, located in a cluster of buildings at the base of the mountain. She tried to recall when they'd gone. It was still hard to measure time after her weeks in a skewed madhouse where night and day could only be measured by fear and the never-ending threat of death. The leaves had changed so it must have been in early October. They'd gone in hopes of tempting her with homemade pies and other sweets when all attempts to get her to eat seemed destined to failure. She'd loved the ambiance. Scarred wood floors, a pot-bellied stove commanding pride of place in the center of the store, around which barrels and shelves and antique cane-back chairs invited a visit and reaffirmation of community—all reminded her of home. She missed that rural life, though hers had had a softer Southern upbringing, where grace and good manners gave the illusion of friendliness. Here, it was all hard-edged, prickly, we-take-care-of-our-own. But she'd felt the old woman's assessment and look of understanding as Eirik had drooled over the crumb cakes and French Silk pies, urging her to sample one or the other. She'd tasted the explosion of goodness on her tongue but gagged at the feel of food passing down her throat.

  She'd always been on the thin side, unlike everyone else in the family, even her mother. Her father was medium height, shorter than her mother by an inch or so, stocky and tough. A Marine by temperament and avocation, Kieran had his mother's height and stunning looks, as well as her self-absorption and predatory nature. But the last time she'd seen her brother, before her flight into madness and losing her heart and soul to the devil, he'd been a wraith, a shadow of himself, wasting away.

  Annoyed, Caitlin kicked at the metal bar holding up the mailbox. She grew weary with memories, they buried her, stifling her focus. She need remember only that evil had a name—Greyfalcon—and that her brother was now collateral damage in some vague cosmic war for mastery of the universe. She smirked at that. It sounded trite but carried elements of truth. That there was weight and import to the nature of the conflict to come simply reaffirmed her commitment, though in truth she needed little motivation. Hate had supplanted all other emotions.

  She turned away from the road and angled uphill, weaving between tree trunks. The surface still retained an icy patina, the light snow not reaching the ground under the tight canopy of maples and oaks. The flakes lazed through the upper reaches, layering in the higher branches, weighting them down until they'd release in a springboard cascade of thick clumps. She punched through, heel first, her body bent at the waist, and pulled forward. The toe of the boot caught under a rim of ice and jerked at her calf. It released, pitching her forward. She laughed out loud as she tumbled face first into a mound of snow, feeling child-like, carefree.

  With a giggle, she lunged uphill, wishing with all her might she could turn into a plow, but content that her Xena-form seemed up to the task.

  Take my hand, sweet companion. We have hours to go before we sleep... Caitlin nodded in rhythm to the words. Hours. To. Go. Her friend and confidant had a poetic streak, though it should not surprise. Revenge wore many personas and she was eager to meet them all.


  ****

  "Sit down, Wolf." Eirik pointed to a chair next to a small pine roll-top desk. “Please.”

  Wolf reluctantly sat on the edge of the chair, ready to bolt. His groin ached and his gut felt like he'd drunk a flagon of pure acid. He so seldom lost control that it was a heady experience, consuming him, going so far beyond simple lust that he was compelled to pursue it, wherever it led him. That it came from her was a shock. But there was no mistaking the mutual flood of energies he'd inadvertently tapped. Even his gothi had noted the exchange. He could understand Eirik's concern, even he would feel the same if it were him having to deal with one of his men in a similar situation. But he wasn't Eirik and he really didn't give a shit. He tapped his foot impatiently.

  Eirik sat on a leather chair and rolled it close to the desk. He liked to gather his thoughts, taking his time nesting the slats, making sure they advanced evenly. The desk had been a gift from a local woman and until now Wolf hadn't really been curious about that relationship or when it had occurred. Everything suggested it had been a most pleasant interlude, obviously mutual, judging from the care with which she'd selected the item. He sighed, not caring that he'd caught Eirik's attention. He had little patience for his gothi to play the age card this day. He allowed his men to believe him off on flights of fancy, doddering down memory lane or 'wool-gathering' as Trey had been so fond of calling it. But the nephew had been cannier than most and rarely allowed the old man the luxury of collecting his thoughts.

  Damn it, why was Trey intruding? He sensed the man's presence as if he were in the same room but just out of line-of-sight.

  Eirik pulled a computer notebook from a drawer, attached the power cord and handed the plug over for him to insert in the outlet. As he bent over he felt the telltale flush and nervous twitching ramp up again, as if he'd ingested uppers or some other stimulant. He'd never felt so compromised in his life and it spoke volumes about the woman's powers.